Thirty years since Sydney's Hilton Hotel bombing : unanswered questions

Thirty years on, two developments highlighted the unanswered questions that persist about the bombing. One was the release of the Federal Cabinet papers for 1977, shedding more light on the extent of the police and intelligence operation mounted before the explosion against the religious sect, Ananda Marga, members of which were later accused of responsibility for the blast. The other event was the laying of a memorial plaque at the site of the bombing, accompanied by official speeches and articles declaring that the explosion proved the need for today's indefinite 'war on terror'. These two developments underscore the causes for concern about how the crime was used politically, and continues to be used, to justify unprecedented expansions of the powers of the police, security and military agencies and deep inroads into fundamental civil liberties and legal rights.